Nigeria is seeking to move beyond traditional outsourcing and position itself as a destination for higher-value, artificial-intelligence-enabled services as governments and companies accelerate investment in the technology.

The remarks were made during the “Hire from Nigeria” session, organised by the Nigeria Economic and Trade Advancement Programme on the sidelines of the just concluded 81st United Nations General Assembly.

The Director-General and Chief Executive Officer of the National Information Technology Development Agency, Kashifu Abdullahi, said Nigeria’s opportunity lies in equipping its workforce not only to use AI but also to develop and deploy the technology for global markets.

Abdullahi joined the Minister of Industry, Trade and Investment, Jumoke Oduwole, and the Minister of Education, Moruf Alausa, for discussions on impact sourcing, global trade, skills and job creation.

The country’s digital economy ambitions are increasingly focused on combining its large pool of technology talent with expanded digital infrastructure, including a planned 90,000-kilometre fibre network, sovereign cloud capabilities, and stronger data protection and cybersecurity frameworks.

“Our opportunity is not simply to supply talent to the world; it is to equip Nigerian talent with AI, trusted digital infrastructure and globally competitive capabilities to deliver higher-value services to the world,” Abdullahi said.

The tech executive said the rapid development of AI presents Nigeria with an opportunity to establish a distinct position in the global services market, moving beyond conventional information-technology outsourcing towards AI-augmented and IT-enabled services.

The shift comes as countries compete to attract digital investment and build the infrastructure needed to support AI applications. For Nigeria, the challenge extends beyond the availability of workers to the reliability of connectivity, computing capacity, data governance and cybersecurity.

The government is targeting the deployment of 90,000 kilometres of fibre infrastructure under Project BRIDGE, Abdullahi reiterated. The initiative aims to enhance connectivity and establish infrastructure that supports expanding connectivity and provides infrastructure to support increased private-sector investment in computing infrastructure and AI factories.

Nigeria is also pursuing a Cloud First Policy and developing frameworks covering data protection, digital identity, cybersecurity, data classification, sovereign cloud and software quality assurance, Abdullahi said. Such measures are intended to give international companies greater certainty over how data and digital services are managed in the country.

The infrastructure push is important because AI-enabled services require more than a large workforce. Businesses deploying advanced AI systems need dependable connectivity, secure cloud infrastructure, access to computing power and regulatory frameworks that allow sensitive data to be handled with greater certainty.

Abdullahi also highlighted the importance of Nigeria’s representation in the development of AI systems. He warned that countries and communities that are poorly represented in the datasets used to train intelligent systems risk having their languages, economic realities and social contexts under-represented in technologies that increasingly shape decision-making.

Nigeria has sought to build domestic AI capabilities through initiatives including the National Centre for Artificial Intelligence and Robotics and the National Artificial Intelligence Strategy. The government says these efforts are intended to strengthen local innovation while connecting Nigerian talent to opportunities in the global digital economy.

The push reflects a broader question facing Nigeria’s technology sector: whether the country can convert its workforce advantage into higher-value exports as AI changes the economics of global services.

Traditional outsourcing has allowed companies to move functions such as customer support, back-office operations and software development to lower-cost markets. AI is now changing those models, potentially allowing companies to automate some routine work while increasing demand for workers who can develop, supervise and integrate AI systems.

A larger fibre network and improved cloud and computing infrastructure could make it easier for international companies to locate their technology operations in the country. But capturing higher-value work will also depend on the availability of specialised skills and the ability of local companies and workers to build expertise around rapidly evolving AI systems.

Abdullahi said Nigeria should therefore focus on developing people who can understand, shape and create with emerging technologies, rather than limiting the country’s role to supplying labour for services designed elsewhere.